A Rose Forever Blighted
by DezoPenguin
Summary: LujeixStaff. Many lovers talk about being together eternally, in this world and the next, but that dream can also turn into an endless nightmare...
1. Chapter 1

A single candle burned at the center of the table, leaving most of the upper room at the Rose and Bell Tavern in shadows. Four men sat at the table, the outlines of their bodies and their undoubtedly rich clothing muffled by hooded cloaks. It was all so very melodramatic, Mazarin Vallancourt thought, but he supposed that even gray eminences could have a taste for such things.

"This is dangerous," one man said. Rich was growing cautious, even hesitant, in his old age.

"Bah!" Talley snapped. "More dangerous to sit by and do nothing." He was the opposite, always inclined to act rather than await events though well aware that acting sometimes created more trouble than it solved.

"We've just escaped the threat of the Archmage Calvaros," contributed the third man. "Can we really afford to risk there being another?"

"But Gammel Dore--"

"Is but one man. Nor has he been able to deliver the Philosopher's Stone. Perhaps he does not wish to?"

"Do you believe he, too, is a threat?" Vallancourt asked. Fouche's exuberance could be troubling; he had a fundamental distrust of power in the hands of anyone other than himself and often advocated a permanent removal of that power.

"The Philosopher's Stone is the ultimate magical treasure," said Talley. "I would not trust it in the hands of any one person, even Gammel Dore. Though I do not say he seeks it for himself, I would ask how serious he has been in his attempts to find it. Leave it hidden, and no one has to resist its temptation."

"Except that it has been found, or near enough," Fouche remarked. "Worse, found by one that I daresay none of us would trust with godlike power."

Rich sighed.

"In that I certainly concur."

"Then we are all agreed?" Vallancourt asked. "We must act to preserve the kingdom?"

The other three men assented.

"How are we to proceed?" Talley asked. "That place is still a fortress, almost as much as when Calvaros reigned there."

"Do not worry," Vallancourt said with a faint smile. "I had already...anticipated this possibility."

-X X X-

"Mmm, I have to say that Gammel was right," a woman's voice purred from the other side of the door. It was a low, rich alto, throaty and sensual. Hearing it, regardless of the words spoken or the fact that she wasn't talking to him, sent needles of fire along the listener's nerves. Her siren's call set up a dull ache in his groin, his body reacting to her even while his mind was reeling with terror at what he intended. _At least lust keeps my teeth from chattering_, he thought ruefully.

Wondering to whom his siren was talking, he bent his head to the keyhole. She was there, seated on her huge, circular bed, long strawberry-blonde hair swirling in a cloud around her shoulders. She wore a gown of the finest silk that plunged at the neckline and clung to the voluptuous curves they covered, the pristine white fabric so near transparency as to be a mockery of the purity its color suggested. It was a gown, despite its decorative frills and ruffles, to be worn for one person's eyes only. _She's expecting me_, thought the watcher, and felt himself pulse with need. It took an act of will to make himself focus his mind, to notice other details such as the elaborate silver coffer she held in her lap.

"I was just going to kill you," Grand Witch Lujei Piche said, "but dear old Gammel didn't think I should. He said that we needed you to find the Philosopher's Stone."

_The Philosopher's Stone!_ A surge of another, very different emotion pulsed through the watcher at its mention. It was true, the hints that she'd dropped before. She _was_ working to find the Philosopher's Stone! But with whom?

"Of course, he couldn't have done it without me," she went on. "He's talented with his elves and fairies, but when it comes to the magic of the _next_ world, that's a different matter. Without me, your soul would be flying off to the afterlife, where I'm sure a warm reception is waiting for a bad little boy like you."

She ran her fingertip in a teasing caress over the engraved patterns on the box, and the watcher suddenly realized who she was talking to. There _was_ no one else in the room! She was talking to the silver coffer, only if he understood her right, it wasn't a box but a soul container holding the spirit of a dead man.

_Mistress Lujei,_ he thought, _what are you doing?_ The identity of the trapped soul was clear to him as well. It could only be the Archmage himself! Calvaros, Lujei Piche, and Gammel Dore had combined their powers to make the Philosopher's Stone, but Calvaros had seized the ultimate expression of magic for himself and established a reign of terror, a fledgling empire that engulfed several of the kingdom's provinces. In the end Lujei and Gammel had been able to somehow defeat the Archmage, but the Philosopher's Stone lay hidden, secreted away somewhere in Calvaros's fortress, the Silver Star Tower--_this_ tower, where Gammel had opened his new Magic Academy.

"Of course, Gammel thought that you'd eventually _tell_ us where you hid it. He's funny like that. I think some part of him genuinely believes it was all Grimlet's doing that you got your sudden urge to dabble in politics. He didn't expect you to be bait in a trap. So faithful they are, these minions of yours. I hope I won't have to break the one _too_ much to get him to tell. He's kind of cute, and I hate to waste a pretty man on principle even if I have one of my own. Which reminds me," she added, putting the soul container down and turning the door, "why don't you come in, my love? I know men like to watch, but it's so much more _fun_ to join in."

The watcher jerked upright, nearly bashing his head on the door in surprise. _How did she know I was here? She always knows! God in Heaven, what if she finds out...?_

There was no point in delaying. It would just make her the more suspicious. He opened the door and went inside; she rose from the bed to greet him. Ice water seemed to be warring with molten gold in his veins as she approached, opposite and overwhelming emotions preying on him. It had always been like this since the first moment he'd entered Lujei's classes in necromancy; she demanded emotion by her very presence, banishing pure reason from her sight.

"Mistress Lujei..."

"_There_ you are." She moved towards him as he shut the door. "So, how does it feel to be a Prince Consort?"

"What...what are you talking about?"

She pressed herself against him, the heat of her body instantly transmitting itself to his skin as if his wizard's robes were as thin as her nightdress.

"One of Calvaros's silly followers wanted to fetch back the Philosopher's Stone to save his dead master. Once he tells me where the Archmage stashed it away, I can fetch it for myself." She smiled winsomely and said, "I think that it would be fun to be queen, don't you?"

Her hand slid down his chest and belly, then dipped lower.

"Mmm, I see that you do." She kissed him warmly and deeply. "Come and show me how much." Lujei drew him back towards the bed and he sank into an embrace of musk and roses.

Later, he lay on his back, her hair spilling across his bare chest while she purred pleasantly like a satiated cat.

"Are you really going to do this, Mistress Lujei?" he asked her.

Her tongue flicked lazily against a nipple.

"Again? I guess it's true what they stay about the stamina of youth. But don't worry; your teacher has much, much more to show you."

"No..."

"No?" She dug her nails into the skin over his ribs. "Do you doubt me?"

"I don't! I...I just meant that I wasn't talking about lovemaking."

She smiled lazily and wriggled against him.

"No? I bet we could change that."

He shuddered in arousal. She was right, of course. Sometimes his body was little more than her plaything, it responded to her so easily, with whatever reaction she desired from it. Indeed, it wasn't merely his physical self that was under her spell. From the moment he'd become her student he'd been enchanted by Lujei. She might not have put him under a literal spell, but she hadn't needed to. Her face and body had demanded his attention at once, but her fiercely intelligent mind and her emotional honesty--not in the sense of truth-telling but in always knowing her own feelings and following them instead of being shackled by anyone's expectations--had captured him. When she'd taken him as her lover he'd felt exalted, burned with a joy he'd never felt before. That this wonderful, compelling woman wanted to be with him (and despite her capricious nature, _only_ him since they'd been together!) never failed to amaze and thrill him.

That was personal, though, between the two of them. It was her other ambitions that terrified him.

Lujei rolled away and folded her arms behind her head.

"But if you insist," she said, "we'll talk instead." Her eyes flicked downwards to the visual evidence of at least part of him to go along with her plan rather than his, and it almost made him smile in return.

"The Philosopher's Stone," he managed to say. "Why take it for yourself?"

"Why not?"

"Why...because Professor Gammel agreed to turn it over to the government. That's why he was able to open this academy, why there's a Royal House of Magic, why magicians are protected by law instead of hunted and feared."

Lujei laughed, a rich and melodious sound.

"And because of that I should give up my desires? Gammel, Calvaros, and I _made_ the Philosopher's Stone. Calvaros wanted it all for himself...well, you know what became of _him_. Why should I let Gammel do the exact same thing?"

"The same thing?"

"Oh, Calvaros wanted to rule the world with it while Gammel wants to just give it away to insure the general welfare and so on, but they're both trying to exercise absolute dominion over the Philosopher's Stone. Do you really think I should allow that without a quarrel? _I_ didn't agree to give it up. I don't even recall being asked. So why should I go along with Gammel's plan? At least Calvaros I can understand, but Gammel wants to _trust_ third parties to do the right thing with the ultimate expression of magic. He has a soft spot for Her Majesty, but she's not a little girl any more. And that's not even counting all those ministers and nobles at Court. Backbiting weasels, one and all."

Lujei's lover tried not to flinch at that.

"But to pit yourself against the government...They'll fight you, you know."

"So?" She stretched lazily, arching her back as she worked the kinks out of her muscles. "Gammel and I had to work together to defeat Calvaros, and we had you and Chartreuse and dear little Opalneria in support. Even that devil helped a bit, in exchange for Calvaros's grimoire. Do you think they'll stand a chance without us?"

"There's still Professor Gammel, and Advocat--"

"Gammel was always the weakest of us three, and the Philosopher's Stone will more than make up for any edge that his glamour magic may have over my necromancy. As for the devil, if he wants to involve himself, then I have a bit of a surprise for him, a new Rune that I've been working on. Don't think that I haven't been planning things through."

"There's still the government and the Church--"

Lujei dismissed them with a wave of her hand.

"Do you expect me to care about them? Power-hungry snakes and self-righteous witch-burners? If they want to throw away their lives, who am I to deny them?"

Her student sighed.

"I see."

Lujei chuckled at him.

"You worry far too much, my dear beloved. Trust me, it's all going to go perfectly."

He sighed again, then forced a smile onto his face.

"I'm sure it will." There was no hiding from it now. His task was clear. "Mistress...I have a gift for you."

"Oh?" Her interest was piqued; Lujei always enjoyed gifts.

He slipped from the bed and crossed to his discarded robe. From an inside pocket he took an octagonal, black-enameled box about five inches across.

"How fancy."

He brought it back to the bed. His heart seemed to be lodged in his throat--yet how could it be, when it was hammering like a snare-drum beat?

"For you, my love."

She took the box and eagerly raised the lid to reveal a single, perfect blue rose, its petals so full and lustrous they almost seemed brushed with dew. Lujei let out a gasp of pleasure.

"Oh, darling, it's magnificent." She brushed her fingers over its petals. "I can sense magic in it."

"A bit of glamour," he admitted. "It won't ever wilt or die, so long as the spell holds. And," he added, a bit shyly, "it was originally a red rose, since that's the only color in Professor Gammel's garden, but I wanted it to match your eyes."

She let out a deep sigh of pleasure as she lifted the rose from the box and inhaled its perfume, then tucked the bud into the neckline of her gown just over her heart.

In the next instant she arched her back in pain as the point of the clipped stem bit into her flesh. Lujei clawed at the rose, but already vines were sprouting from it, snaking around her limbs and torso, thorns biting into her skin like the fangs they were. Lujei collapsed onto the bed, the enameled box clattering across the floor. The witch thrashed and convulsed as the rose's venom pulsed through her system. She screamed in torment, the sound all but reducing her killer to tears before it, and she, mercifully came to a quick end.

With a trembling, shuddering hand he felt her throat for a pulse; there was none. Dark blue patches like blossoms of decay were already forming under her skin, marks left by the enchanted toxin, and he pulled his hand away as if it would taint him as well.

_It would serve me right_, he thought, then added defensively, _but I had no _choice_! You wouldn't stop this insane plan!_

The student took one last look at the face of his dead lover, then shuddered horribly and fled. The irises of her eyes, which had indeed been the same color as her killer, were now the same deep crimson as the rose had been in life.

--

_NOTE: The names of the _eminences grises_ who appear in the first scene are taken from four historical powers-behind-the-throne in French history: Richelieu, Mazarin, Talleyrand, and Fouche._


	2. Chapter 2

"Necessary?" Gammel Dore did not so much say as roared. "The assassination of a personal friend, the co-founder of this academy, and a magician without whose aid this kingdom would have been quivering under the Archmage's yoke these past years? That last ought to mean something to you even if the rest does not."

Vallancourt did not retreat quivering before the old wizard. He wanted to, of course--what sane man wouldn't?--but the will that had brought him to the post of Chamberlain kept him in place.

"All of those things mean something to me," he stated, not without some truth. "But I am not so thankful for her freeing us from Calvaros that I would give the country to her, instead."

"You're serious?"

"I'm sure you've heard the story already." Vallancourt nodded towards the student, who cringed back from the two men of power. "You wouldn't have summoned me here in such...intemperate terms if you had not."

Gammel's gaze swept from Vallancourt to Lujei's apprentice.

"Lujei seeking the Philosopher's Stone..." he muttered. "She was always a creature of whim, but this goes beyond caprice."

"You said it yourself, Grand Magician. The practice of magic needs to become no different from that of a physician, a lawyer, an architect, or any other profession requiring training and study, an ordinary part of society rather than something cloaked in superstition and hysteria. To have the _protection_ of the law, however, requires that one be _subject_ to the law."

"The law! Since when does the law encompass political assassination?"

"Can you seriously imagine _arresting_ Lujei Piche? Or that she'd meekly submit to a proper trial for treason? Surely you are not so naive," he snapped back, unimpressed. "Should we have waited until she had the Philosopher's Stone in hand? How many men and women died fighting the Archmage?" Setting superstition aside himself, he met the old wizard's gaze. "I did what was necessary for the safety of the realm. It was an ugly act, but as you know, life is not pretty. Can you dispute me?"

"I wonder very much why a government that protects itself by such acts is _worth_ protecting?"

"You are not protecting the government, Grand Magician Gammel," Vallancourt permitted himself a faint smile at his own expense. "I don't flatter myself that you would exert yourself specially for my sake or for assorted ministers and Court hangers-on. But I believe you and I are both alike in being loyal subjects of Her Majesty? To say nothing of the general welfare of the commonfolk."

Gammel scowled again.

"You argue like a devil, Vallancourt."

"A necessity, I am afraid, in our world. But then, I understand that an accomplished sorcerer would be aware that a bit of deviltry can serve the greater good."

"Your 'greater good' revolts me, Chamberlain."

"At times, Grand Magician Gammel, I revolt myself."

Their gazed met again.

"I can only hope for your sake, Chamberlain, that God is a more merciful judge than I would be in His place."

Vallancourt did not smile outwardly, but he was in his heart. One day, perhaps, he would fear divine judgment, but the main point was that he would _not_ now fear _Gammel's_ judgment. Her Majesty had a vested interest in the Grand Magician, and there was no doubt which of the two of them she would prefer to keep were Gammel to demand justice for Vallancourt's "creative solution" to the Lujei problem.

"There is one more thing," he said, changing the subject. "The Philosopher's Stone. Have you had any luck in following up on Grand Witch Lujei's ownership?"

Gammel shook his head.

"Unfortunately not. Whatever she may have done with the Archmage's minion, we have been unable to find out. Even after death, it seems that Lujei keeps her secrets."

"I will so inform Her Majesty. Good day, Grand Magician."

"Good day, Chamberlain."

Gammel watched impassively as one of the servant elves led the Chamberlain from the room. Only when the gray eminence had gone did he at last give forth a long, bitter sigh. _Is this the point of all I've worked for? To watch friends die and to do nothing to save or avenge them?_ He wished they'd never heard of the Philosopher's Stone! The joy, the sheer triumph they'd felt at fulfilling the ultimate promise of magic had turned to dust. First Calvaros and now Lujei had been corrupted by the damned thing and killed because of it. Now Gammel was the only one left, and what was he? A helpless old man with a devil sleeping at his breast and a second waiting in the wings for his will to slacken.

"What are you still doing here?" he barked at the man who'd loved and betrayed Lujei.

"I--I thought--"

"If only you'd _thought_ then! You should have come to me, not the government! Something could have been done."

"Professor Gammel--"

"No! I won't hear that title from your lips. You are no more a student than you are a lover. I may not be able to give you what you deserve, but at least I don't have to suffer your presence any longer than necessary. This is the last night you'll spend under this roof. Be gone by morning!"

-X X X-

Moonlight, the student thought, was for lovers. It was only appropriate, then, that there was no moon to be seen that night through the high, arched windows that lined the tower's outer hallway. He'd found himself too restless to sleep, but the night air was doing nothing to cool his fevered thoughts.

Couldn't Gammel understand? He'd been terrified, horror-struck to do what he did. He'd loved Lujei. It was just that the cost of letting her keep on was too high! It was he and he alone who would have to bear the pain of that choice. Vallancourt and his ilk cared nothing about it. To them human lives were pawns to use and discard; they had no personal stake, no morality, no emotions. He himself had been the only one to risk anything. Now his love was dead, his future destroyed.

He paused before one of the great arches, then turned to look out. The tower at this point was over a hundred feet high. _High enough,_ flittered through his mind.

"Well, well. Contemplating suicide, are we?"

He jerked back from the window as if struck, spinning towards the voice--

Nothing there.

_Nothing. How could there be anything?_

"Don't you know that's a mortal sin?"

_Impossible!_

He whirled again, looking up and down the hallway. There was nothing there, only the empty darkness. And yet, he'd heard it, twice.

"L-Lujei?" he stammered.

"An eternity in Hell..." Just behind him, this time. He spun around.

"...won't even _begin_ to compare to your punishment." She was there, floating in front of him, as beautiful as ever. The blue rose-vine that embraced her like a lover had sprouted several new buds; she wore it almost like an accessory. Her body was faintly translucent so that he could just make out the shapes of the wall carvings behind her, and she glowed with a pale light.

"M-Mistress Lujei!"

The ghost smiled winsomely.

"I'm touched you remember me. After all, didn't you say that we'd be together forever?"

"I--"

"Do you mean that you didn't mean it?" She batted her eyelashes in a parody of a winsome maiden as she drifted towards him. "Oh, I can't bear it. I love you too much to let you become a liar." Then she smiled, with a look that was neither winsome nor maidenly. "So I'll make sure it's the truth."

He backed--no, _fell_--away from her, reeling until he hit the far wall of the passage and could feel the elaborate stonework through his robes. His mind sought desperately for escape. He was a magician, after all, a master necromancer. Lujei was a ghost, theoretically subject to the power of necromancy.

He started to sketch a Rune, but a staff suddenly appeared in Lujei's hand and smacked down on his fingers. The gesture was like a teacher smacking a student's hand with a ruler for a mistake in penmanship; the blow itself snapped bone and made him scream in pain.

"_Naughty_ boy. _I_ certainly didn't teach you to use magic on your lover. Where did you _ever_ learn such bad habits, hm?"

The spirits of the dead could still use some of the powers after death that they possessed in life. How much, then, did the Grand Witch's ghost hold?

Her body pressed against his in a parody of the embraces they'd shared in life. Her touch was cold, so cold it burned, and she exhaled rose-scented breath as she spoke in a purring whisper.

"Come with me, my love. How can we spend even another moment apart?" Pale flame swirled up around them as his world dissolved in a haze of pain.

-X X X-

"P-P-Professor G-Gammel! Professor Gammel!" Amanda Stoli babbled as she burst into the wizard's study, nearly crashing into the huge brass orrery that dominated the center of the room. Gammel looked up from his book, annoyed to be disturbed, but the second-year student's obvious agitation stilled that response at once.

"What is it, Miss Stoli?" he asked gently.

"It's...we found...there's a body, Professor Gammel!"

"A body?" he exclaimed.

"In the hallway outside my room, Professor! I swear it wasn't there when I went to bed last night!"

Gammel nodded.

"Please, show me at once. Is it anyone you know? A student, or one of the teachers?"

"I--I don't know," she stammered out. "It was wearing robes, but..." Another shudder racked her. "The face...it was unrecognizably..."

There was no point in forcing her to endure the telling; he could see for himself. Rising, he let her lead the way through the tower's winding halls.

"T-there it is, Professor," Amanda said, pointing as they stepped off a curving stairway.

"Thank you, Miss Stoli. You may go now. I'll take it from here."

"Thank _you_, Professor," she replied with obvious gratitude that she wouldn't have to go near the corpse again. She scuttled off back down the stairs.

Gammel, however, had no one to life that burden. As he drew nearer, it became clear why Amanda had been so shaken. An unknown corpse was a bad enough thing to suddenly discover where one shouldn't be, but it was obvious this one had died violently and not quickly. The marks of torture revealed by the torn and bloodstained robe were obvious. His gorge rose at the brutality of it, then rose again as he realized what the student had been unable to express about the face.

The face was there. Indeed, it was unmarked by any injury, the only part of the body to be spared that. Yet it was still a horrid, distorted thing. Someone had apparently cut a long slit at the base of the neck and extracted the corpse's skull, leaving the skin intact like an empty pouch. Gammel had to repress a shudder at the thought not only of the killer keeping such a grisly trophy but the delicate operation it would take to remove it in such a way. It was as if a special point had been made to say, "I only need the skull; you can have the rest of this back."

The face was horribly distorted without a skull to shape it, and the clothing badly damaged by the tortures their wearer had endured, but Gammel was at last able to recognize the dark blue robe with green trim and a hint of the handsome and still-boyish features.

"I wanted you gone from this tower," he said with a sigh. The identity of the man he'd thought had left three days ago pointed all but inevitably to the killer; which in turn told Gammel why the skull had likely been taken thanks to his own knowledge of necromancy. "I suppose that someone else preferred that you stayed."

He sighed again. He'd have to investigate this to see precisely where they stood, but in an odd way his heart was lightened. He should have known that a little thing like murder wouldn't be enough to impose a mere government plotter's will on Lujei Piche.

-X X X-

"I never really appreciated the night air when I was alive," Lujei said as she floated through the moonlit corridor. "I guess the philosophers are right when they say that death puts everything else in perspective."

"I...don't think they meant it that way, Mistress." Though it had no lungs to draw breath nor larynx to vibrate, the skull mounted atop her staff spoke clearly and audibly with the movements of its jaw.

"That's only because only the living seem to write on the subject," Lujei caroled, spinning around the staff like it was a fixed column or pole. "They should try it sometime; it's really not all that bad. Of course, the travel restrictions are a bother. I don't know why the Philosopher's Stone should hold me here, since it's not like I ever touched it again after Calvaros stole the pesky thing. At this rate I won't be able to tell all those silly politicians what I think of their politics before they're gone, too." She smiled again, then nuzzled her translucent cheek against the skull. "But at least I can be together forever with the man who loves me beyond all...how _did_ you whisper it to me in bed again? Oh, yes, 'beyond all others, more than the moon and the stars, with a love that not even the angels in heaven can match, forever and to eternity.' That was it."

She clenched her fingers tightly around the staff and white fire seemed to pulse up it from her grip and into the skull. The fleshless head seemed to shudder, then gave forth a sound somewhere between a shriek and a strangled gasp.

"Yes, I think forever will be just long enough, don't you, my darling?"


End file.
